How much faster will a rMBP be over my MBA?

Bought a 13" MBA as my first Apple product. Got it to do video edits of GoPro as the PC was a PITA to use. So far I am just using I-Movie and it works for now. The wife is going to need a new laptop. We both like the size and function of the 13" MBA. Only down side it the time it takes to process movies from the Drop box to I-Movie. My question is how much of an improvement will I see if I I get the 15" rMBP over the MBA? Going to buy either a rMBP or another MBA in the next month.

Not sure if I should move up to Final Cut to use for editing or is there a better Mac program that I should look at?

Thank you for any information. This is my first post, have been reading the forum for a few months.

Bought a 13" MBA as my first Apple product. Got it to do video edits of GoPro as the PC was a PITA to use. So far I am just using I-Movie and it works for now. The wife is going to need a new laptop. We both like the size and function of the 13" MBA. Only down side it the time it takes to process movies from the Drop box to I-Movie. My question is how much of an improvement will I see if I I get the 15" rMBP over the MBA? Going to buy either a rMBP or another MBA in the next month.

Not sure if I should move up to Final Cut to use for editing or is there a better Mac program that I should look at?

Thank you for any information. This is my first post, have been reading the forum for a few months.

Bill in Stockton

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Why are you processing movies from Dropbox to iMovie? Why not have your movies local? That can be much of your hangup. Why not get an external USB 3 or a TB hard drive to throw all your movies and videos?

For some objective data on difference, go to geek bench to check out the difference in benchmarks. Geekbench is CPU heavy.

My question is how much of an improvement will I see if I I get the 15" rMBP over the MBA? Going to buy either a rMBP or another MBA in the next month.

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you will see a huge improvement with a 15" rMBP especially with apps like FCPX.
quad-core processor for starters, plus NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with 1gb VRAM (in addition to the standard Intel HD Graphics 4000)

Why are you processing movies from Dropbox to iMovie? Why not have your movies local? That can be much of your hangup. Why not get an external USB 3 or a TB hard drive to throw all your movies and videos?

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This how the Apple help line told me to load my video off the SD card out of the GoPro. I do have a 1TB usb3 external drive that I store my finished videos on. The slow part is loading to Imovie and processing after I finish editing.

This how the Apple help line told me to load my video off the SD card out of the GoPro. I do have a 1TB usb3 external drive that I store my finished videos on. The slow part is loading to Imovie and processing after I finish editing.

How should I be importing from my GoPro to Imovie?

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Apple told you to use Dropbox? Why not import off your SD card directly into iMovie or your USB 3 drive?

This how the Apple help line told me to load my video off the SD card out of the GoPro. I do have a 1TB usb3 external drive that I store my finished videos on. The slow part is loading to Imovie and processing after I finish editing.

How should I be importing from my GoPro to Imovie?

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Either load your footage to your MBA or your external drive. From there you should edit your footage in iMovie (note that it will be faster on your MBA SSD then external). After you finish your editing, make sure the project is on your SSD before you convert your finished project into a format as this will speed up processing the project. After you finish processing your project throw it back onto your external.

Note: When working with your footage from DropBox it will be the slowest processing in iMovie. If you use your external for processing the footage into iMovie it will be much faster as it is 5Gbps (though you will see roughly 50-100MB/s). If your footage is on your SSD it will be the fastest as it can read around 250MB/s.

Sage advice all. Dropbox is fine for a lot of things but has no place in your video processing work flow. That is your speed problem.

I looked at the 15" RMBP last spring and decided that the price of a maxed out one, around $4000, did not fit my budget especially as I do much of my work on the Apple 27" monitor anyway. For half that price I bought a maxed 13" MBA and love it.

What he said above... you are limiting the speed of your computer because of access to DropBox of your download speed and DropBox upload speed. Get an external USB3.

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Sorry to meander down this tangent, but can you help me to understand? I work out of my Dropbox folder and haven't noticed any performance degradation--but maybe I'm not looking at it correctly.

I've thought that Dropbox "saves then distributes;" keeping local copies until there's an update to a file; then uploading that update to the user's cloud-based folder; and then downloading it to all the local Dropbox folders. So files can be used offline and later sync when there's an internet connection. And, so, saving to the DropBox folder is like saving to any other local folder except this folder selectively sucks files into the cloud in an action separate from the saving.

Sorry to meander down this tangent, but can you help me to understand? I work out of my Dropbox folder and haven't noticed any performance degradation--but maybe I'm not looking at it correctly.

I've thought that Dropbox "saves then distributes;" keeping local copies until there's an update to a file; then uploading that update to the user's cloud-based folder; and then downloading it to all the local Dropbox folders. So files can be used offline and later sync when there's an internet connection. And, so, saving to the DropBox folder is like saving to any other local folder except this folder selectively sucks files into the cloud in an action separate from the saving.

Sorry to meander down this tangent, but can you help me to understand? I work out of my Dropbox folder and haven't noticed any performance degradation--but maybe I'm not looking at it correctly.

I've thought that Dropbox "saves then distributes;

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my issue with Dropbox is that one cannot setup a 'public' folder that anyone can access without needing a password or to have a Dropbox account.
unless I'm missing something, there was no way I could get it to work.

LaCie on the other hand have 'Wuala' which is a snap to use on a Mac and has the public access folder available for anyone, plus one's own 'private' folders

New to the apple stuff. My Gopro records in mp4 and it looks like the conversion to mov file to edit in Imovie is what is taking the time. Will Imovie edit an mp4 or do I have to do the conversion? Will FCPX edit mp4? I need to get to an Apple class on Imovie, just not any close to where I live.

New to the apple stuff. My Gopro records in mp4 and it looks like the conversion to mov file to edit in Imovie is what is taking the time. Will Imovie edit an mp4 or do I have to do the conversion? Will FCPX edit mp4? I need to get to an Apple class on Imovie, just not any close to where I live.

Thanks for all the help.

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Next time you convert a movie, start "Activity Monitor" (it is in the Utilities folder inside the Application folder), and in the "Window" menu turn on "CPU usage". If CPU usage is low, then transferring the data takes the time, and a rMBP won't help. If CPU usage is high, then the rMBP will make a huge difference. 4 cores instead of two, and they are each a lot faster than the ones in the MBA.

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